There were some things shown me in regard to you. I saw that the candle of the Lord does not shine about you. He is displeased with you. I was shown that your object in coming to Michigan³

Eight months earlier, in October 1858, at the request of James White, John Byington and family had moved from their home in Buck's Bridge, New York, to the Battle Creek area.

See: Obituary: “John Byington,” Review, Jan. 25, 1887, p. 57.

was good. It was well for you to come. But you have failed in your purposes, and that which should be to you of the greatest importance has come in secondary. Your interest has come first, and the work of God, or things of eternal interest, secondary.^{4
Farther on in this letter Ellen White expands on this thought: “You love this world, and your heart is altogether too much wrapped up in the things you possess.” Similarly, on a visit to John Byington two months earlier she found him “cold and unfeeling,” being “too much wrapped up in the things of this world.” Part of the problem seems to have been that the move from New York to Michigan had involved financial loss. This caused Byington to descend into a state of “gloom and unbelief.”
See: Ellen G. White, Ms 6, 1859 (Apr. 16 entry); Lt 28, 1859 (June/July).} I saw that in your vicinity there was an interest awakened; hearts could have been reached. But your energies were exhausted in your own interest, for your own advantage, and your labor spent in God's work was a lame sacrifice and unacceptable to Him. There was an opportunity for you to have made a sacrifice, to put into the hands of others to do what you have done, even if things had not exactly suited you, and been at considerable more cost.1EGWLM 672.5

Your commission has not run out. Your time is not yours. God does not wait in His work for you to study your convenience or wait your time.⁵

Although Byington was previously an active itinerant preacher, for about a year from the summer of 1858 there is no record of his filling any preaching appointments. Finally, in July 1859, after receiving this challenging letter (and probably also Lt 28, 1859 [June/July]), Byington resumed his evangelistic work. “He looked happier than I had seen him for months,” Ellen White noted in her diary on July 12, 1859. “Says after a week he is going out to labor for the Lord.”

See: Ellen G. White, Ms 7, 1859 (July 12).

Angels of God were prepared to trouble hearts, and through the instruments of God's choosing lay the truth before unbelievers. But the instrument was not ready to do his part, to throw his whole energies into the work, and be a mouthpiece for God. The angels in their work wait not for anyone's convenience, but pass on to do their work, fulfill their mission, and move on other hearts.1EGWLM 673.1

Responsibilities are on you that you little realize, and your love of this world leads you astray from your duty. You study your interest, and how you can save a little means, when you should be studying what is your best course to save your fellow man. Satan takes advantage of your carefulness and caution and leads it to be exercised in the wrong way. Nothing exists, in reality, to cast gloom upon your soul; but you dwell upon the dark side, talk doubts and unbelief, which is death to your own soul and has a deadly influence upon others. You dishonor God. You grieve His angels by your unbelief. Your influence is not saving.1EGWLM 673.2

There must be an entire change in you in these things. You love this world, and your heart is altogether too much wrapped up in the things you possess. Your commission is not a matter to be laid aside at your will. Your heavenly Father claims your time and obedience, without any murmuring or complaining or unwillingness on your part.1EGWLM 673.3

I was pointed back to about one year ago. Your feelings then concerning the purchase of a house for Brother Bates [Joseph Bates]⁶

Identity: Circumstances described in the following note leave little doubt that Ellen White has Joseph Bates in mind.

were prompted by the enemy. Selfishness lay at the bottom of it. And since then you have not been closely united to James.^{7
This may be a reference to the house built for Joseph and Prudence Bates in Monterey, Michigan, which was at least partly financed by donations from local church members (see Ms 8, 1859 [note on Nov. 17 entry]). This interpretation is not entirely without problems because the evidence suggests that the Bates did not move into the Monterey house until early 1860 (see above citation), which seems to conflict with Ellen White's statement that the problem arose “about one year ago,” i.e., in 1858. Another possibility would be that James White had made a house available to the Bates in 1858 before the move to Monterey in 1860. This may or may not be related to Joseph Bates's later testimony that “at one time” James White “furnished me with a house for my family for fourteen months, for which he refused to receive rent.”
John Byington was clearly unhappy and felt that James White's leadership had been compromised by what he considered a display of unjust favoritism toward Joseph Bates. In response to this charge Ellen White responded in another letter to Byington: “God's ways are equal. He does not require one to sacrifice everything and another to make no sacrifice at all.” In terms of sacrifice, as Joseph Bates's biographer George R. Knight describes it, Bates had been living “on the financial edge” while carrying on a full-time itinerant ministry ever since the mid-1840s, when he donated his life savings of $8,000 to $10,000 dollars to the cause of preaching the Millerite message. It should also be noted that Bates later willed the house that had been given him in Monterey to the Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association.
See: John Nevins Andrews et al., Defense of Elder James White and Wife, p. 24; George R. Knight, Joseph Bates, pp. 184, 169; Ellen G. White, Lt 28, 1859 (June/July).} There has been a pulling off. You have felt wrong. I was shown that when you gave yourself up wholly to the work of God, then your love for this world was much weakened.1EGWLM 673.4

I saw that God had been very merciful to you. God has heard the earnest prayers put up in Martha's [Martha Dormer Amadon (née Byington)]⁸

Identity: That the reference is to John Byington's daughter Martha is suggested partly by the intimation of family in the wording of this paragraph, and partly by confirmation from Ellen White's diary that Martha Byington had recently been seriously sick but healed in response to prayer (see note below).

behalf, and spared her life when she was marked for the grave.^{9
Probably a reference to the situation two months earlier, when the Whites had prayed for Martha, the 25-year-old daughter of John and Catherine Byington, who was “much reduced with fever and ague.” In response, writes Ellen White in her diary, “the Lord truly met with us. Martha was blessed and strengthened.”
See: Ellen G. White, Ms 6, 1859 (Apr. 16 entry).} And when your own life was in danger, God was merciful to you. Disease was upon you, but as you ventured out in the name of the Lord, angels were hovering around you and Satan was disappointed of his prey. God is angry with you. After He has given you such merciful tokens for good, you have murmured against God. You have not realized this, but it is so.1EGWLM 674.1

If you had but a very little of this world's possessions it would be better for your eternal interest. That which you have is a great trouble to you.1EGWLM 674.2

I saw that you are standing in your own light and in the way of the salvation of your children. God has given them a heart to love the people of God. They see the consistency that there is in the truth, and the work for them now is to identify themselves with God's people. Here is the cross. God cannot come into your dwelling and set things in order there. You stand right in the way of the work of God.1EGWLM 674.3

Picture: John Byington and his wife, Caroline1EGWLM 675

Picture: Daughter, Martha, and son, John F. Courtesy of the Center for Adventist Research.1EGWLM 675

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